Business as usual on a strong foundation and with clear future vision

Dear Customer,

Firstly, let me thank you for your continued support of Trust Media in 2011.

The start of 2012 has brought about some exciting changes associated with the sale and privatisation of Trust Media.

There has been some speculation and comment on media and social networking platforms with regard to the positive changes that have taken place at Trust Media over the last two weeks and I wanted to take the opportunity to write to you, personally, explaining these changes and giving you clarity as to our future direction.

1. Acquisition of Trust Media – You will have seen that I recently acquired the Carlisle-based activities of the John Ritchie business from The Lord's Work Trust. This embraces all of the Trust Media Distribution business and Penfold Card & Gift. I am pleased to underline that this transaction has facilitated a strong financial position and investment funds for the future development of Trust Media. I would also like to clarify that Trust Media will continue to be the exclusive wholesale partner for John Ritchie Ltd distributing all of their published content to the UK trade.
2. Cost base review – As part of the privatisation plan and our reduced focus on UK content it was imperative that we review our cost base to ensure that our strong financial position is maintained. This review has been carried out in an appropriate and sensitive manner with our staff and will reach a conclusion in the next few days. We have planned this necessary reduction in head count carefully and sought at all times to minimize the number of roles affected. We believe that this process will have no impact on our support for your business or continued high levels of service. This is, however, a difficult time for those who are impacted and we do ask that as this process concludes you would uphold those affected in prayer.
3. Trust Media is fully committed to the Christian trade and will continue to focus on and improve its service to Christian retailers. However, in the current economic climate it is essential that the business has the necessary breadth and focus on other market opportunities that will allow us to strengthen our profitability and ensure continuity of service to your ministry. With this in mind we have in recent months expanded our card and gift offering into the secular market with encouraging results. This expansion facilitates stronger relationships with manufacturers who we rely on for Christian content and adds value to and compliments our Christian product range. I am confident that the development of this strategy will play an important role in enabling us to support you as a valued customer.
4. UK wholesale supplier review - We recently completed a review of our UK supplier base and have concluded that we will reduce the number of suppliers we will bring to market, confirmed UK publishers that we will be supplying in 2012 are Christian Education, Christian Focus Publications, Collins, Continuum, DayOne, Evangelical Press, Lion Hudson (Lion, Candle, Monarch and Baker) and Hodder & Stoughton.
5. US wholesale suppliers – We are also continuing to develop our US wholesale supplier range, with 40 US publishers including Zondervan, Tyndale, Thomas Nelson, Harvest House, Crossway, NavPress, Moody, Random House (Waterbrook/Multnomah), B&H, Destiny Image (US & Europe), Gospel Light, Kregel, Whitaker House, Twin Sisters, Concordia, Group, Shepherd Press, Gospel Folio, Bardin & Marsee, AMG, YWAM, Lifeway, Dake and many more.
6. Distribution Suppliers – I would also like to confirm that whilst we are making changes to the UK wholesale supplier base, we are continuing to build on our UK contract distribution supplier base; including Authentic Media and BRF.
7. New Trade website – Evidence of our ongoing investment and commitment to the trade is underscored in the launch of our new trade website last weekend. We have received numerous positive comments and look forward to building on this enhanced capability over coming weeks and months.
8. Stock – We have been focusing on improving stock levels from publishers that we will continue to supply. We have in the last week received large quantities of stock from many of the suppliers listed above and you should see a subsequent strong level of availability with immediate effect.

I trust that this clarification is of help and importantly underlines our undiluted and continuing commitment to the continued distribution and wholesale of Christian books, Bibles and resources to you. My focus (and the most significant part of our business) remains on our development of exciting and mutually beneficial services to the Christian Trade.

May I take this opportunity to wish you every success in 2012 and assure you of our ongoing support of your ministry both in the provision of product and associated service excellence.

Ken Munro

Trust Media Distribution